Great Smoky Mountains National Park: A Natural History Guide - Softcover

Michael Collier has been the director of the Bread Loaf Writers' Conference for five years and has taught English at the University of Maryland, College Park, for fifteen years. His previous volumes of poetry are THE CLASP AND OTHER POEMS, THE FOLDED HEART, THE NEIGHBOR, and most recently THE LEDGE, finalist for the Los Angeles Times Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award. Collier is the recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship, NEA fellowships, and the Discovery/The Nation Award, among other honors. He resides in Maryland.

These first entries in a new series dealing with the natural history of our national parks belong on every public library shelf. In her work on the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Houk strikes a balance between the standard "isn't-it-beautiful" book and the "millions-of-years-ago" geology text. Her presentation of the wildlife, plant life, history, and development of the nation's most visited national park reads more like a diary than a natural history guide. And just when you thought that everything had been said about the Grand Canyon, Schmidt comes along to change your mind with a wonderfully written, skillfully crafted look at this often-visited but often-overlooked park. Schmidt obviously loves this wilderness area, and he manages to share this love with his readers. More than a puff piece on the Grand Canyon and more than a dry ecology text, Schmidt's book is instead a personal narrative that manages to present fresh information on the flora, fauna, history, and development of the canyon. If these two vol umes are any indication of what's to come in this series, libraries are in for a treat.
- Joseph L. Buelna, Vandenberg Air Force Base Lib., Cal.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.